UK College of Arts and Sciences Writing, Rhetoric and Digital Studies alumni continue to make meaningful contributions in classrooms, studios, newsrooms and creative spaces across the country. Helena Arjona, a 2025 graduate, reflects on the experiences in WRD that helped her discover her voice as a storyteller and inspired her work in photography, videography and film. In her own words, Helena describes the moments, mentors and courses that set her on the path to graduate study and a future in the film industry:

“Coming into my undergrad at UK, I played around with a few different majors, but I was never really sure what I wanted to do. I always loved storytelling, but I was not sure how it could fit into my professional life after college.

I stumbled across Dr. Brian McNely’s Visual Rhetoric class in my second semester of college. I was a shy freshman who never raised my hand in class, and I was not sure how I belonged in a class full of confident upperclassmen.

But something about Visual Rhetoric felt different for me.

I found myself loving the way Dr. McNely taught, and I was eager to come to class each week. I looked up to him not only as a professor but also as a photographer, and it encouraged me to try it for myself.

I will never forget coming into class with my newly taken pictures one chilly morning in April, eager to show Dr. McNely. He asked, “Did you really take those yourself?”

My newfound love for photography soon guided my college career. Photography grew into videography and filmmaking, and soon I was chasing every opportunity to create new things.

I took opportunities within WRD to push myself out of my comfort zone and learn how to tell stories that made an impact. Every class, from WRD 405: Writing Comics to WRD 306: Editing English Prose, was another chance for me to learn something new that could help me create.

In May 2025, I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Media Arts and Studies and a Bachelor of Arts double major in Broadcast Journalism and Writing, Rhetoric and Digital Studies.

Now, I am a master’s student and teaching assistant here at UK, studying communication with a research interest in media studies. Following graduation, I hope to enter the film industry.

My love for storytelling has taken me down many different avenues, from newsrooms in Kentucky to accepting scholarships for my documentaries in New York and attending award shows in Los Angeles. But I never would have been confident enough to follow my passion if it was not for WRD and Dr. McNely.”